Battle resumes in the ABSA South African Off-Road Championship with the staging of the Sun City 400 on the 16th and 17th July after a lengthy layoff to accommodate the soccer World Cup. With three events run out of the eight in the series Toyota leads the Manufacturers’ Championship with 250 points to the 87 of second placed Ford.
For this fourth round in the championship the Castrol Team Toyota works Hilux SP’s of reigning South African champion Duncan Vos, teamed with Rob Howie, and Anthony Taylor and Robin Houghton, have undergone a comprehensive teardown and rebuild in preparation for what promises to be a tightly contested second part of the series. “We worked hard at improving our two Hilux SPs over the first part of the season within a very tight event schedule,” says team principal, Glyn Hall. “The niggling issues that impeded us early in the season were resolved for the Sugarbelt 400 where the Castrol Hilux SPs were right on the pace with second and third place finishes in impossible dust behind the privateer HIlux of Chris Visser.
“As with all motorsport any gain in performance typically comes from the incremental effect of numerous small changes and the team has worked really hard on such a programme of refinement during the break since the last event. Early in the year we made a fundamental change to the suspension of our vehicles. A lot of work has gone into fine tuning that to make the vehicles not just more stable over rough terrain but more comfortable to drive as well with both Duncan and Anthony now showing far less fatigue during events. The extended break between events has given us an opportunity to carefully analyse the work that we have done and fully test the revised package. We believe that we have a good overall package going forward to the next five events.”
With three events run so far the championship remains very open with both Duncan Vos and Anthony Taylor well in touch of points’ leader Chris Visser as the championship resumes. With 125 points still to race for Duncan Vos is just 16 points off the lead and Anthony Taylor another seven behind in what is developing into a fiercely competitive championship.
Castrol Team Toyota is partnered by the Innovation Group, providers of warranty and service plan administration services to Toyota South Africa, with the Imperial Group partnering the team with the provision of logistics support.
– Credit: Toyota of South Africa.